Md. Nurun Newaz Salim, Chairman of NCC Bank Limited, inaugurates an ATM booth at Elephant Road in the city recently.

NCC Bank Ltd. opened two new ATM booths at Elephant Road and Maghbazar in the city recently.

Md. Nurun Newaz Salim, Chairman of the Bank, formally inaugurated the booths as chief guest. Director Ainul Kabir, sponsor Kazi Monirul Alam and managing director Mohammed Nurul Amin were present as special guests.

Among others, deputy managing directors T M Faruque Chowdhury and Akhtar Hamid Khan, executive vice president Md. Omar Faruque Bhuiyan and senior officials of the Bank were present on the occasion.

The Daily Sun/Bangladesh/ 19th March 2012

A corporate partnership agreement was signed between weekly magazine First News and First Security Islami Bank Limited on Thursday at the head office of the Bank in Gulshan in the city.

Under the agreement, First Security Islami Bank Limited (FSIBL) will subscribe to First News every week for senior executives, branches, libraries and other important places of the Bank.

Bashir Ahmed, Managing Editor of First News, and Azam Khan, Head of Marketing and Development of First Security Islami Bank Limited signed the agreement on behalf of their respective organisations.

Syed Waseque Md Ali, Deputy Managing Director of First Security Islami Bank Limited, Shaily Fatima, Assistant Editor of First News and other senior executives of both the organisations were present at the signing ceremony.

The Daily Sun/Bangladesh/ 19th March 2012

Bangladesh Bank Governor Atiur Rahman speaks at inaugural session of a daylong workshop at the “Regional Town Hall Meeting” for the supervisors of the central bank's Chittagong and Sylhet offices at Hotel Agrabad in Chittagong yesterday.

The Bangladesh Bank governor yesterday said he expects to see changes in the manner the central bank conducts banking supervision.

The banking regulator will constantly be more and more focused on risk, and less on routine tasks, as most of the supervisors of it are involved in the on-site inspection process, said Atiur Rahman.

"You'll be particularly interested in the changes we have planned in on-site supervision," he said at the inaugural session of a daylong workshop at the “Regional Town Hall Meeting” for the supervisors of the central bank's Chittagong and Sylhet offices.

The Department of Off-site Supervision, Dhaka and Bangladesh Bank, Chittagong jointly organised the workshop at Hotel Agrabad on "Promoting banking excellence and integrity at the branch level".

"Banking has changed and as banking regulators we must also change. The old assumptions, old certainties and old procedures just aren't sufficient anymore," Rahman said.

There are risks and vulnerabilities in the country's banking sector, and the central bank has to work harder and work smarter to uncover these risks and promote best practices in banks, he said.

"This is what we mean by promoting banking excellence."
Above all, best practices mean sound judgment in the granting of credit, lending to legitimate borrowers who have the ability and the intent to repay, he said.

Best practices also mean diligent monitoring of all credits through their life cycles, he said, adding that banks have to maintain an internal risk-rating system for all borrowers and monitor their ability and willingness to repay constantly.

"When you are visiting a bank branch as part of an inspection team, pay close attention to the branch management. Talk to them, listen to them, ask them questions. Assess their qualifications and assess their character," he said to the supervisors.

"In many cases, information about illegal or unethical activity taking place at a bank branch comes from lower-level employees. If you see something that looks wrong, in the loan files or anywhere at the branch, say something. Tell your supervisor."

Very often, illegal or unethical conduct by branch managers or staff is indicative of the same kind of conduct at the head office, Rahman said.

Abu Hena Md Razee Hasan, BB deputy governor; Mohammad Noushad Ali Chowdhury, executive director, and Masum Kamal Bhuiyan, Chittagong general manager, also spoke.

Glenn Tasky, BB banking supervision adviser, and Muhammad Allah Malik Kazemi, senior consultant, conducted the workshop.

The Daily Star/Bangladesh/ 19th March 2012

Atiur Rahman

Bangladesh Bank is working continuously to develop a modern information technology based efficient and secured banking system with a view to increasing stability in the financial sector. We have already introduced multifarious system including online banking, e-commerce, Automated Clearing House, Bangladesh Electronic Fund Transfer Network (BEFTN), online CIB service, bank-led mobile banking service, new services in the Information Technology (IT) sector especially outsourcing facility and liberalization of foreign exchange transaction system.

Recently, Bangladesh has been identified as the most potential country for IT in a research report of the KPMG, an international organization concerned with financial audit. Due to present increase of business expenditure of the IT developed countries especially in India and Philippines, as an alternative country Bangladesh is considered as the most potential country in this sector in the world. Apart from this, in Bangladesh number of English knowing diligent young people who are expert in information technology is increasing substantially day by day.

Above all, the capacity of Bangladesh to forward through competition with other countries has been increased significantly. Considering all these factors, we have already withdrawn the restrictions which halt expanding IT business.

There is no way to deny that we are very careful to create a business-friendly 'Regulatory Regime'. Due to unprecedented expansion of IT, we have already issued necessary directions and guidelines to facilitate our resident people to bring foreign exchange earned against exporting Business Processes Outsourcing (BPO) services to abroad through using internet. Consequently, any person or institution can bring any amount of foreign exchange earned against exporting BPO services through Authorized Dealers (ADs).

Besides, Online Payment Gateway Service Provider (OPGSP) plays a very significant role as a medium of bringing small amount of foreign exchange earned against services provided by free-lancer. That is why, we have issued necessary directions to the ADs to take help from the OPGSP to bring small amount of foreign exchange at low cost earned against exporting IT services. Initially, at best US$500 can be brought through the OPGSP. But if necessary, we will consider extending this limit on observation of real income flow.

There are other service exports such as business services, professional/ research and advisory services etc., rendered from Bangladesh against which payments in foreign exchange are received through ADs. Along with these services ADs have been given necessary directions to bring foreign exchange earned against exporting non-agency services. Upto fifty per cent (50%) of export proceeds earned from service sector can be preserved in the Exporter's Retention Quota (ERQ) account in foreign exchange.

Foreign exchange reserved in this easily exchangeable ERQ account can be freely sent to abroad to meet business expenditure of the concerned exporter and international credit card may also be accepted against the balance. This credit card can be used to meet other necessary expenses.

All these initiatives of liberalizing foreign exchange transactions will hopefully create opportunity in bringing foreign exchange without any hassle earned against exporting services and help to create business-friendly environment in exporting services. As a result, exporters will be encouraged in exporting other services along with information services.

On the basis of the initiatives by the Bangladesh Bank (BB), Canada-based online money transfer agency 'AlertPay' has recently commenced its operation in Bangladesh. Along with the Government, BB has also already taken necessary steps to involve Bangladesh into activities of 'Pay Pal' the most popular Online-Payment Gateway of the world. Bangladesh, we hope, will be involved into the service of 'Pay Pal' very soon.

It is a great pleasure for us that operation of Canada-based online money transfer agency 'AlertPay' is being introduced in Bangladesh through Bank Asia. Consequently, through this online service our resident people or institutions will be able to bring their export proceeds very easily against exporting non-physical services i.e. data entry, data processing, data digitization and conversion, animation and multimedia, software developing and customization, search engine optimization, social marketing, off-shore IT services, web-design, mobile application developing, and free-lance outsourcing of graphic design.

Bank Asia is launching the service of 'AlertPay' as the first Bank of Bangladesh. We hope that other banks will also be encouraged to follow the step of Bank Asia.

Bank Asia is launching not only the service of Online Payment Gateway 'AlertPay' but also mobile banking service namely ''Express Cash'. It is a kind of remittance service through which Bank Asia will be able to transfer money from one place to another within the country.

By this system, people at any place of Bangladesh can easily make transactions through mobile phone and clients can receive SMS notification and money receipt as the evidence of their transactions. This system provides customers with banking services very swiftly going beyond the banking transaction hours.

We expect that the Bank will open 'Express Cash' service point in the remotest areas of the country to convey mobile banking service to the doorstep of the customers. This financial service of this Bank is consistent with the mobile banking policy of Bangladesh Bank. At the same time, innovative quality has also been reflected in this own platform-based service.

Mobile banking is an alternative to traditional branch banking by which it is possible to provide efficient and swift financial service at a minimum cost to the unbanked people. Through using mobile phone technology, this system makes the disbursement of foreign remittance; transaction through coordination of ATM, VISA & Master Card network; payment of salary, allowance and pension, payment of utility bill, collection of school fees, immediate balance recharge of mobile phone, payment of government allowance etc. more easier.

Mobile banking can play a vital role by providing financial service to the mass population out of banking service. Bangladesh Bank has approved 17 banks to launch mobile banking service to facilitate them to convey banking service to the doorsteps of people with the help of mobile phone operators and 10 banks have already been able to commence their mobile banking activities. We believe that rest of the banks will be able to launch this programme very soon.

Banking service can reduce poverty rate by using information technology. Because common people can get the advantages of modern banking service at low cost with the benediction of technology and easy banking activities increase saving tendency in the common people. We would like to invite all concerned people to increase the financial services by using the utility of modern information technology like mobile banking.

This is an adapted version of the speech, delivered by Dr Atiur Rahman, Governor, Bangladesh Bank, at the launching event of online payment gateway, 'AlertPay' and also of mobile banking service 'Express Cash', by Bank Asia Ltd., in Dhaka last week

Financial Express/Bangladesh/ 18th March 2012

US lawmakers yesterday pressed President Barack Obama to nominate economist Jeffrey Sachs as the next World Bank president as the White House scrambled to pick a different candidate ahead of next week’s deadline.

In a letter to Obama, 27 fellow Democrats in the House of Representatives said that Sachs, whose self-declared candidacy has drawn a number of endorsements from around the world, has the leadership skills for the job.

Meanwhile the White House appeared still not ready to submit its own nominee to run the global development bank, a week after leaking out a shortlist of three high-powered possibilities— none of them Sachs.

The Daily Sun/Bangladesh/ 18th March 2012